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Full-Text Articles in Law
Pink Tax And Other Tropes, Bridget J. Crawford
Pink Tax And Other Tropes, Bridget J. Crawford
Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications
Law reform advocates should be strategic in deploying tax tropes. Through an examination of five common tax phrases—the “nanny tax,” “death tax,” “soda tax,” “Black tax,” and “pink tax”—this Article demonstrates that tax rhetoric is more likely to influence law when used to describe specific economic injustices resulting from actual government duties, as opposed to figurative inequalities. In comparison, slogans describing figurative taxes are less likely to influence law and human behavior, even if they have descriptive force in both popular and academic literature as a short-hand for group-based disparities. This Article catalogues and evaluates what makes for effective tax …
Evolutionary Statutory Interpretation: Mr. Justice Scalia Meets Darwin, Jeffrey G. Miller
Evolutionary Statutory Interpretation: Mr. Justice Scalia Meets Darwin, Jeffrey G. Miller
Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications
This paper examines the seeming contrast between the legal doctrines that the interpretation of statutes can evolve over time and that the interpretation of statutes must be grounded only in their texts, which never change unless amended by Congress. That examination is illuminated by complexity and meme theories. The examination is concluded by applying both doctrines and theories to the question of whether the term “navigable water” in a water pollution control statute includes underground water.
Legislation And The Environment: Individual Rights And Government Accountability, Richard L. Ottinger
Legislation And The Environment: Individual Rights And Government Accountability, Richard L. Ottinger
Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications
Recent public concern with the pollution threat has generated a rash of suggested solutions. Within the past year councils, agencies, advisory commissions, and billion-dollar programs have been urged upon us. Reorganizations and reorderings of priorities have been called for. The question remains, however, whether this welter of proposals squarely attacks the real problem-the fact that all of our institutions are rooted in the notions of inexhaustible supply and limitless ability to repair. The answer can be found only by examining specific conflicts between technology and environment and analyzing the way our institutions attempt to resolve them.